Fox Gives a Green Light to ‘Independence Day 2’

Happy Thanksgiving! Okay, enough of that, let’s talk about a far more important holiday, at least cinematically speaking: Independence Day and ‘Independence Day,’ and specifically let’s talk about the film’s sequel. The follow-up to Roland Emmerich’s 1996 movie about Will Smith, Jeff Goldblum, and Bill Pullman fighting off an alien invasion has been in development at Fox for a while now, and for a long time the plan was to make two ‘ID4’ sequels back to back. At that point, Smith’s participation was a question mark, with the studio supposedly going so far as to write two versions of the script; one with the Fresh Prince and one without him.

Smith was ultimately a no, but Goldblum and Pullman were apparently a yes, and according to Deadline, Fox is high enough on the material to give it a green light and start gearing up for a summer 2015 production (and, eventually, a June 2016 release). The key development, though, is that, per “Fox insiders,” the studio is now making just one single sequel (or, at least, they’ve only “green lit one” at the moment). Emmerich is expected to return as well, directing a script he co-wrote with Dean Devlin, James Vanderbilt, and Carter Blanchard. The no-Will Smith part is a bummer, but if we get to see Pullman give one more rousing speech to the people of Earth as President Thomas J. Whitmore, that’s reason enough to give thanks this Turkey Day.